Soap & Salvation
Antiques, Vintage, Interiors and Art.
Soap & Salvation has a collection of spaces which celebrates design and creativity through things with a past life. Gain inspiration from the personally selected decorative antique and vintage pieces by owners Jo & Barrie. Appreciate the skill of the designer, artist and craftsperson.
Welcome to No. 18 - 22 Rope Walk. Let us show you around…
View from the main Chapel looking into the Side Chapel.
ANTIQUE & VINTAGE CUSHIONS
Cushions made from antique and vintage linens including woven striped fabric from Holland. Traditionally used for formal underskirts and beautiful old linen sheets with embroidered initials hand dyed and sometimes printed using natural dyes and hand-painted techniques.
The main Chapel.
METAL & WOOD ADJUSTABLE STOOL BY FICOSTRA
A metal and wood adjustable industrial stool made by Ficostra C1920-30 with historical painted finish.
The main Chapel.
EMMA BURRILL CERAMICS
A metal and wood adjustable industrial stool made by Ficostra C1920-30 with historical painted finish.
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CONCRETE SCULPTURE OF A BIRD
From the works of André Hardy C1970. Hardy, an ironworker who lived in Normandy, created a fantastical landscape of concrete sculptures in the yard beside his house. Since mounted on vintage painted metal stands.
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ANTIQUE DURHAM QUILT
Hand stitched with the traditional broken Welsh chains design. In cotton sateen C1920.
The main Chapel.
VINTAGE ARTWORK BY HENRY CLIFFE (1919 - 1983).
Painter, printmaker and teacher Cliffe was selected for the British pavilion at the Venice Biennale alongside Ben Nicholson, Francis Bacon and Lucien Freud. This work in pastel on paper is float mounted and framed in a hand-painted deep recess frame.
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A PAIR OF 19TH-CENTURY WOODEN TRAMP ART PRICKET CANDLESTICKS.
This method of folk art style wood work is characterised by notch carving and the layering of geometric shapes. It often used available wood such
as cigar boxes and shipping crates and is made utilising simple tools such as penknives.
The Library.
Housing a personally curated collection of books and other publications, many of which are for sale. Focused on titles in the art, design, fashion, photography, architecture and textiles worlds and often of limited edition, out of print or first edition. The library is continually being added to and is soon to be launched online.
Now you've had a look around Soap & Salvation we would like you to meet Jo & Barrie Mcpherson.
When did you move to Rye, and how did your idea for a business develop?
We moved to Rye permanently in January 2021 but had been coming here regularly for about eight years before then. We both worked for a design company in London which was fast-paced and demanding. Our weekends and holidays in Rye were an antidote to that. Driving down after work on a Friday evening, you felt your stress levels falling as soon as you turned off the A21 towards Rye.
It’s a well-worn tale, but we bought a little house here in the centre of the town on The Mint. We worked with a local builder and his team to restore the house and then started the fun process of choosing colours, fabrics and furniture pieces. This was our first real foray into antiques and vintage, with many of the pieces being sourced in Rye and the surrounding area. As we couldn’t be in Rye every week, we decided we should also rent the house out to holidaymakers rather than have the place lying empty. We started to get enquiries from some guests about items they wanted to purchase or wished to find. This gave us the idea to create a small online shop selling antique and vintage pieces that we loved. Our prerequisite was that it should always be something we would want to have in our home.
The online shop started from our house, where we stored stock and photographed in a spare room. We were limited in what we could sell by the size of our space and the scale of what could physically be photographed. Projecting our vision of how the pieces could sit together within a home was also tricky. That said, it was a perfect learning curve that sparked our passion for this new venture.
Is that when you decided to set up a physical shop that people could visit?
We had started to feel we were at a point in our careers where we wanted a change of scene and new challenges. Having always worked for others, we thought it was time to work for ourselves or at least give it a go. Although we knew we wanted to develop our online offer into something physical, we had yet to consider this being a shop. We envisaged a showroom and place to photograph our stock more efficiently. We were hoping for a live/work space with the character and scale that would enable us to create something special.
Rye was where we wanted to be, so we were avidly searching for a property that would fit the bill. We looked at a variety of different spaces, some rural, others less so. There must be some higher power that stops you from pursuing something that, with hindsight, you realise would have been a big mistake. There were most definitely a few of those.
One day an e-mail popped up from Phillips & Stubbs in Rye introducing ‘an interesting live/work opportunity’ that was about to come on the market. We visited the next day and knew this was the place we were looking for. Of course, the location in Rye was important, but the space drove us. So then, the idea of opening a physical shop started to form.
How did your name come about?
That came from the history of the building. The Salvation Army offered people Soup, Soap and Salvation. As a business that source, prep and sell antique and vintage furniture, we felt that the Soap & Salvation part was rather well aligned with what we offered and had a bit of a light-heartedness to it. It just felt instinctively right.
“We didn't want a straightforward shop; we wanted an interesting space in which to share beautiful things.”
Can you tell us about the space?
It is a set of buildings; the largest of the spaces is a former Salvation Army Chapel, built in 1903. The layout has changed as the building has had different uses over the past 120 years; doors have moved, and windows adapted. We are not 100% sure, but the side chapel may have been part of the cattle market at some stage, although we do know that the main chapel was, at one stage, a bus garage. The cottage is a much older property and was here long before the chapel. Part of that had at one stage been a sweet shop and, separately, a motorbike showroom. Behind the chapel is a simple brick building which had been used as a workshop and storeroom by the previous incumbent; however, we have since realised it was built as a stable, as the original bricks are evident on parts of the floor. It appears our studio was originally the hayloft.
When we arrived, we set about restoring the buildings, the cottage came first as we needed to move in there, and the chapel followed. We worked with local builder Geoff Goldfinch and his team, who, in turn, worked with local joiners and other trades and craftspeople on all aspects of the project. We had to replace most of the windows, all the electrics and plumbing and deal with a lot of damp. But the building had the most beautiful bones; they just needed some looking after. The light that streams through the chapel’s windows is just wonderful and has a special and tranquil quality.
When we first developed the buildings, the pantry room was a back-of-house space where we could pack and wrap sales. Somebody came in and asked, are you mad? This is such a beautiful space; you should also have stock in here. Jo is a utility brush and basket obsessive, so this became the area for those alongside vintage linen tea towels, aprons, napkins, and tablecloths made from antique and vintage linens hand dyed for us in France.
The workshops are next on our to-do list. They haven’t yet been touched and are in dire need of some attention. We have worked with England Architects who are based in Rye Harbour to reimagine the space within and make it more usable. It will be a stock room but one that is beautifully presented. Once that work is complete, one final stage remains in the restoration, which is the landscaping of the exterior areas; we are looking forward to that.
This project has definitely taken longer than we had initially thought, but we had some excellent advice from a client to take our time. That was wise advice; we have felt our way through the work and changed our ideas along the way. It feels reassuring not to have to charge through something.
Tell us about what we can expect to find at Soap & Salvation.
We predominantly sell decorative antiques and vintage pieces for the home, including furniture, art, objects and textiles. Our style is a mix of rustic and modernist, with pieces coming from across the world and dating from the 18th century to the 1970s. We also have a library of art, design and photography books and catalogues which reflect what we love or are inspired by. They are generally limited editions or out of print. Most are for sale, but even those that aren’t can be perused. Barrie has always loved collecting books, so this area is his real passion. He is currently working towards getting this online; it’s quite a mammoth task.
Amongst our offer, a few pieces are newly created, such as natural fibre brushes and hand-dipped candles. It has always been important to us that you are able to come in and pick up something for a few pounds which is beautifully made and aesthetically pleasing.
One of the newest additions to our offer is the ceramic work of Emma Burrill, who we met when we first opened our shop. Our library of books gave her insight that we might have a few things in common, and a conversation ensued. Last summer, we visited Emma at home to see her beautiful garden. We were struck by a collection of white ceramic vessels sitting on the window ledge of the studio she shares with her husband, graphic artist Anthony Burrill. We thought they were vintage and were interested to find out more. However, it came to be that they were Emma’s creations. They complement our offer and style, so we are thrilled to showcase them within our shop. Every piece she creates is unique, and her approach is to create a family of vessels which are interrelated. It is so special that no two of her pieces are the same and echo the approach we have with our unique finds. We are looking forward to adding some of her new work later this year.
Jo & Barrie McPherson
Soap & Salvation
18-22 Rope Walk, Rye TN31 7NA
www.soapandsalvation.com
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